


Flight #1539, Inbound from Denver, Will Be Delayed

by Sab



Category: The X-Files
Genre: (Uploaded by Punk), Airports & Airport Bars, F/M, Jerks in Airport Bars, Unresolved Sexual Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 1999-10-12
Updated: 1999-10-12
Packaged: 2017-12-03 09:47:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,168
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/696958
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sab/pseuds/Sab
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>While waiting for Mulder at the airport, Scully meets a man who is just obnoxious enough to be her type. (Uploaded by Punk, from Gossamer.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Flight #1539, Inbound from Denver, Will Be Delayed

There is nothing like an airport. The taste of dry, dead, recycled air. The smell of carpet - not new carpet, not dirty carpet - just carpet. The hum of the fluorescent lights nearly drowning out the murmur of people turning pages, waiting. The palpable unspeakable nervousness, the fear of death, the fear of flying everyone hides by laughing too loud, rustling through bags looking for their walkman, their sunglasses, this month's Cosmo. The waiting that just gets worse with frustration at being late coupled with that secret desire to be bailed out, to have the flight cancelled so you don't have to risk it, this time. People changing identities. Running to things. Running away from things. It's the same, everywhere, every city, every crowd, from the afternoon college kids to the red-eye business class, from the Redwood Forest to the Gulf Stream waters: there is nothing like an airport to make a person want a drink. 

It was well past midnight, now. Mulder was late, and Scully was frustrated. Philadelphia was a fine town but with a two hour drive back to DC ahead of her, she was itching to get on the road. Now she couldn't remember why he'd chosen to fly in to Philly instead of DC - cheaper fares or frequent flyer or something - but she was damning him for the decision. And herself for coming up here to get him. 

There is nothing like an airport to make a person want a drink, and Scully was no exception. She'd waited at the gate for over an hour, but Mulder's flight had been delayed indefinitely due to fog or smog or somesuch, and the raging stink of fear on the concourse gave Scully chills. So she'd described Mulder to a nice young man waiting for his wife at the gate, told him where to find her, and she'd gone to the airport bar where she'd neatly put away three gin-and-tonics before she realized she was out of cash. Another nice young man smiled and paid her tab. The bar was empty except for the two of them, and Scully thanked him with a nod and sat and drank in silence. Then he spoke. 

"Missed your flight?" he asked her. 

She looked up. Tall, dark, bordering on seedy and just her type. Goatee, little stainless-steel glasses, jacket over t-shirt and suspenders. She smiled. 

"I'm picking someone up." 

"Husband?" 

"Partner." 

"Oh - I'm sorry - I didn't realize you were..." He backed away, almost imperceptibly. Scully laughed.

"No. My, uh, FBI partner." She flashed her badge, knowing oddly, and for the first time ever, that it was cute that she'd done so. Sexy, even. It wasn't lost on the man, either. 

"Paul Mueller," he said, extending a hand. 

"Dana Scully," she said, shaking it. He chuckled. 

"I know, I, uh, read it on your ID." 

Scully reached to slip her badge back into her pocket, and missed. She leaned over to pick it up off the floor. 

"Whoa," she said, sitting up straight again. _Didn't know I was that drunk_. 

"Can I buy you another or are you pretty much done?" Paul widened his eyes. Scully looked at the empty glasses before her. 

"Buy me another." _I'll let Mulder drive_. 

He did, and she took a long draw off of it before turning back to face him. 

"I assume you missed your flight, then," she said. 

"Yeah. I think I did it to myself on purpose. I think my psyche's telling me I'm in no hurry to get home." 

"And why is that?" 

"Wife. Angry wife. Your standard bag." 

"Oh really?" 

Paul studied the countertop, then looked up at Scully with something akin to guilt. "It's stupid, really. I'm, uh, I'm a sound engineer for a band on tour, and Kara usually comes with us but this time - god, I'm such an idiot -" 

"You wanted to go alone? Believe me, I understand." 

"Wait. You _are_ married?" 

"No. But sometimes it feels like I am. All the drawbacks, none of the perks, you know?" 

"This partner of yours?" 

"Yeah. Whatever. I'm sorry. Keep going." 

"You were right. I said something along the lines of 'you don't have to come to Philly if you don't want to,' and she said something like 'you don't want me to come with you?' and I said something like 'there's no reason for you to be stuck following me around...' and then she did that passive-aggressive thing, you know, shrugged it off, but, I mean, how do you get out of that?" 

Scully nodded. "You don't. We just did the same thing. We had a case in Denver and I was going to go along, but Mulder told me not to bother - so I didn't bother. And here I am." 

"You did it too, didn't you? The passive-aggressive thing." 

"I usually think of myself as aggressive-aggressive, actually," Scully tried to laugh. "I wasn't offended." 

"But here you are. Waiting at the airport for hours for him." 

"Here I am. Like an idiot." 

"How many times did you call?" Paul smiled tauntingly. "Be honest. When he was in Denver." 

Scully looked at the floor. "I called a couple times. But only to follow up on the case." 

Paul shook his head, still grinning. "Sure. I bet it went something like this: 'hey, partner, how are you doing in Denver?' and he says 'Fine,' and you pull out one of those 'well, okay then, whatever, I guess you don't need me, poor me, left in Philly all alone -'" 

"DC, actually." 

"You drove up from DC to pick him up here?" 

"I had things to do in town." 

"Sure." 

_Who does this guy think he is?_ Scully eyed him suspiciously. 

"So? Am I right? Is that pretty much how the phone calls went?" 

"I don't see how it's your business," Scully said finally. 

Paul shrugged. "You haven't slept together yet, have you." It wasn't a question. 

"Yet?" Scully raised her eyebrows. 

"Oh, you will. How long have you been together - a couple of years?" 

"Six," Scully said firmly. 

Paul snorted. "Jesus. Well then. What, is he horrifically ugly?" 

"He's not ugly," Scully said. "Just, uh, a little obsessive. Not my type." 

"So it never even crossed your mind." 

"What?" 

"Or maybe it never crossed his mind." Paul was baiting her, and Scully bristled. 

"What are you getting at?" 

"Look at you - you've got your empy glasses lined up like you did it with a carpenter's level," Paul said. "Don't tell me you're not obsessive." 

Scully sprung to defense, despite herself. "Look, first of all, fraternizing between agents is totally against bureau policy." 

"Oh, so _that's_ why it never happens." Paul clucked his tongue. 

"And second of all - we're friends. Good friends. That's just not what it's about between us. He's got his crusades, he's brilliant, he cares about his work, and we -" 

"What? You what?" Paul baited her again. "You work well together?" 

"Very." 

"He's brilliant, huh?" 

"Very." 

"Okay, so how many good relationships have you had since you partnered up with this guy? I'm guessing none. You don't strike me as a woman who's been laid nearly as often as she should be." 

Scully scowled. "That is definitely not your business." 

"Okay," Paul shrugged. He slid a newspaper from his backpack and began reading. 

Scully stared into her drink. _Where the hell was Mulder?_ She knocked the ice around in her glass idly. _I don't even want to think about this. I just want to get in the car and go home. Who does this guy think he is?_ She looked at Paul out of the corner of her eye. _He was cute, five minutes ago. He's still cute. And maybe he's right. Whatever. Whatever._

"I'm sorry. I'm just a little tired," she said. Paul shrugged, still reading. 

"Hey, come back," she said, gently, lightly, giving him a poke in the arm. _I can still flirt if I have to. Prove I've still got it._

"Nah," Paul muttered. "You're a lost cause, baby." 

"And why is that?" 

Paul set down his paper. "HE went off to Denver. HE'S got his crusades. HE'S brilliant. What about you? You've let this guy take over your life." 

"Hey, I'm no slouch!" Scully was defensive again. "He respects me." 

"You want to know how Kara and I got together?" 

Scully nodded. 

"We were in a band together, after college. I played guitar and wrote our stuff - she was the lead singer. She thought I was god's gift, that I could write this poetry, that I could make music happen. And I'll admit, having that kind of worship was a big turn-on. But also a big turn-off, because she was so starry-eyed." 

"I do _not_ worship Mulder!" Scully gritted her teeth. 

"Okay," Paul shrugged again. "But you wanna know how long we were in that band together? Four years. Four years and nothing happened. She dated some other people - I dated a lot of other people - but nothing took, nothing stuck." 

"And then what happened?" 

"She quit the band. She went into philosophy, got a job with an academic journal. Wrote a great paper on French Feminism, won all sorts of awards. And all of a sudden it wasn't about me anymore. She was doing something - she was good at it - and all of a sudden I was, like, blind with rage for having let her go. For having passed this great thing up when I could have had it. So I chased her down." 

Scully considered for a minute. "So, what? So if I want Mulder to fall in love with me I should quit the FBI?" _Oh my god what did I just say?_

"Well now. This is progress," Paul rapped his fingers on the table and the bartender took his glass away. "Jack and coke," Paul said to the bartender. 

"I'm just asking if that was what you implied," Scully continued weakly. 

"Uh huh," Paul said. "Actually, I was implying that you're no good to anyone as long as you're still living in this asshole's shadow." 

_Asshole?_ Scully clenched her jaw. 

"I gotta confess - I saw you sitting here, and I thought, she's pretty enough. No, that's a lie. I thought, she's gorgeous. I thought, maybe I'm not supposed to go back to San Francisco tonight after all. But talking to you -" 

"What?" 

"Just, get a life, you know?" Paul picked up his paper again. 

"I'm a doctor," Scully said, after a pause. 

"Congratulations," Paul said, still reading. 

"I'm a good doctor. Mulder knows it. He respects me for it." 

"Ever asked him?" 

"I don't have to." 

"Ah, the beauty of the unspoken language," Paul said. He put the paper down and turned to Scully. "Want to get a room?" 

"What?" Scully nearly dropped her glass. 

"Someone's gotta do it. You're about this close -" he held up his finger and thumb, a centimeter apart, "from reclaiming your long-lost virginity, am I right? Maybe you'll be better off if someone pops that cherry again." 

"You're a jerk, you know that?" Scully said. "Thanks for the drinks - I'm gonna go back to the gate to wait." She rose to leave. 

"Not as chivalrous as your gallant partner, am I?" Paul said. 

Scully sat down again. "No. I pity your wife. Leave Mulder out of this - this is about you trying to bait me with some line about how my life is inadequate, and I don't know if it's ever worked for you, but it sure isn't working with me. My life is fine. My relationship with my partner is fine. He's a wonderful, attractive, brilliant man -" 

"Yeah, you mentioned that," Paul laughed. 

"And my relationship with him is the best relationship I've ever had with anyone. Whether we're sleeping together or not." 

"You're drunk, bitch," Paul said, shaking his head. "Don't try to rationalize. You want to fuck this bastard more than you've ever wanted anything in your life. Just admit it. It'll make you a lot more pleasant to be around." 

Scully burst. "Of course I do! Of course I do! But that's not the point! We've worked together for six years, we've been through so much shit together - things you couldn't possibly imagine. We owe each other more than what you consider love in your pitiful life! Of course I love him! And when we decide to be together it's going to be so, so much more than some scumbag in an airport bar asking me to get a room. Jesus, all Mulder has to do is touch me on the shoulder and I've got chills - but at the same time, I've got to know that I would lay down my life for him, and that he would for me - and I would! Of course I would! Because I trust him! And does that change the fact that even after six years I still get a lump in my stomach when he walks into the room? No! And we fight and we argue but we do it because we are so much better together than either one of us could be individually! We're partners, damn it! And despite that, and because of that, I love him with every drunk, passive- aggressive bone in my body! Blind with rage because you passed up a good thing, you said? You don't know the half of it! So get the hell out of here, get on the plane, go home to your poor misguided wife and your poor misguided life and leave mine the hell alone!" 

Scully collapsed back on the barstool, finally, and buried her face in her hands. She could hear Paul laughing, that smug, superior laugh, and she bit her lip and tried to breathe slow, even breaths - tried to resist the urge to slug him. 

She felt a tap on her shoulder. "What?" She said through clenched teeth. She peered up through eyes welled with tears of rage and frustration. It was the bartender. 

"Here." He set a cup of coffee in front of her. "It's from the man at the end of the bar." 

_Oh. My. God._ Scully didn't want to look, but she turned her head, stared down the bar's glossy surface to a figure sitting five or six stools away. Fingers she recognized, spread out on the table. Arms she recognized. _Oh. My. God. Mulder._

Without thinking, Scully leaped to her feet and ran out of the bar. 

Mulder caught up with her halfway down the corridor. Tired travelers slipped by almost eerily on the moving sidewalk - Mulder and Scully stood on the carpet, under the bright, buzzing fluorescent lights. Mulder reached out a hand, rested it on Scully's bicep. She shook him free, afraid of his touch, afraid to look at him, afraid of everything. 

"How much did you - " she muttered at the floor. 

"What do you want me to say?" Mulder answered softly. "I'll say whatever you want me to say. I'll tell you I didn't hear any of it." 

"How did you find me?" 

"Guy at the gate told me where you'd be." 

Scully looked up. "And you didn't say anything? Mulder? You didn't let me know you were there?" 

"I walked in about ten minutes ago. Caught that guy saying something about French Feminism, and I didn't want to interrupt in case you were, you know - " 

Scully laughed, tears streaming down her face. 

"And then it got interesting, so I thought I'd listen for a while." 

Scully flung an arm at him, smacked him in the chest. "How could you do that!" Her voice cracked, she was exhausted, she had nothing left in her to fight with. "How could you let me go on like that?" 

"How could I not?" Mulder said, gently. "It's like hearing your own eulogy. Most people don't get the chance." 

Scully nodded, shaking. 

"Hey," Mulder said. "Come here." He reached out, folded her into his arms, letting her sob against his chest, heaving and shuddering and snuffling. "It's okay. It's okay." 

"It's not," Scully said through tears. "It's not. It won't be. Everything's ruined and awful." 

"No. No," Mulder said, holding her tighter. 

"Feeding your ego is all I did," Scully muttered, almost laughing. "Like you really needed that." 

"You wanna know something?" Mulder asked. 

A couple walking by brushed against them with a suitcase on wheels, and Mulder and Scully sidestepped, together, out of its way. 

Scully pressed her palms against Mulder's chest and looked up at him. "Yeah." 

"I, uh, I have conversations like that all the time." 

"Conversations like _that_?" Scully blinked. 

"Well, maybe not the screaming part. Mine are usually the brooding kind. You know, staring into my soup, bemoaning my fate." 

"About me?" 

Mulder kissed her on the head. "Who else? You were right, Scully, everything you said was right. I may not tell you this, but it's only because I always assume you know - you're the most important thing in my life. You make everything I do make sense - your intellect and your insight and your drive for explanation. You make me believe that there's some force out there to balance all the awful things that happen, all the terrible things we see everyday. So, yes. Conversations like that. All the time. Never with you, though." 

"Never with me." 

"Why is that?" 

Scully went to pry herself free from Mulder's embrace, thought better of it, and fell into his arms again. He smelled like airplane, like carpet and cigarettes and food wrapped in aluminum foil. He held her to him, his arms tensed as if he were afraid she'd slip away. 

"We'll talk about it," she mumbled into his shirt. 

"We should," he said. 

"Not tonight." 

"Okay," he said. "What happens tonight?" 

"We've got to get home," Scully said, her tears leaving wet circles on Mulder's chest. 

"True." 

"Or, um..." Scully began. "I don't know, Mulder." 

Mulder kissed her on the head again. 

From the world, outside, she could hear the PA system calling out in low tones respectful of the late hour: "Passengers arriving on Flight 1539 nonstop service from Denver International can collect their luggage at carousel B in the main terminal." The conveyer belt of the moving sidewalk whirred in time; people muttered and hustled all around them. The carpet still smelled like carpet; the air still tasted dry, and dead. The fluorescent lights cut the night in that artificial glow exclusive to only airports and casinos - places where night and day aren't distinct entities. Suitcases on casters bumped along. Passengers departing pounded down the corridor, racing to make their flights, heavy with that tangible pre-flight fear. Excitement and fear. Everyone needed to be somewhere, everyone was making good time. And Scully stood there, her face pressed against Mulder's chest, giving it up, giving it all up, for once, the shoulds and the musts and the "we've got to's." Not tonight, here on international ground, in this little insular world, in the place where time is of the essence and time stands still. There is nothing like an airport.


End file.
